Epoxy resin formulations are excellent electrical insulators and protect electrical components from short circuiting, dust and moisture. In the electronics industry, epoxy resins are the primary resin used in packaging electronics in the manufacture of printed circuit boards, integrated circuits, transistors, hybrid circuits, and the like.
Electronics packaging typically includes using an epoxy resin to encapsulate one or more polymer layers having dies and dielectric or metal circuit interconnectors. Current epoxy encapsulating methods include temperature-sensitive processes such as curing, pre-cleaning, and degassing necessary to remove moisture and improve the material properties of the package.
These temperature-sensitive processes are conventionally carried out at temperatures that may range from about 100° C. to about 200° C. The type of heat used depends on the requirements of the temperature-sensitive process and particular application of the electronics package. Typically, one or more heat sources provide resistive, convective, radiative, or microwave heating, as desired for the temperature-sensitive process or electronics package application. The temperature of the epoxy is typically measured, monitored and, controlled during each heating process in order to ensure high quality cleaning, moisture removal, and process uniformity. Throughput is normally enhanced by performing the temperature-sensitive processes on batches of multiple packages. Currently available temperature measuring techniques include contact thermometry and non-contact thermometry using infrared pyrometers. However, the inventors have discovered that the currently available temperature measuring techniques fail to accurately and reliably measure the temperature. The inventors have further discovered that the currently available temperature measuring techniques inadequately measure the temperature during the processing of a batch of multiple packages.
Therefore, the inventors have provided improved apparatus and methods for measuring, monitoring and controlling the temperature during packaging.